


Asymmetry

by gingerandrust



Category: Ouran High School Host Club - All Media Types
Genre: Brothers, Gen, Twins, mirror image twins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-25
Updated: 2012-06-25
Packaged: 2017-11-08 13:38:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/443754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gingerandrust/pseuds/gingerandrust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The problem, help them, was that they were not actually identical.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Asymmetry

**Author's Note:**

> This idea has been bouncing around ever since I first learned about mirror image twins.

 

The problem, help them, was that they were not actually identical.

They never had been, not since the very beginning when their single cell, in a fit of pique, had held together for almost a week before finally dividing into two.  From the moment one became two, they had been different.  Asymmetrical. 

At first, they had not understood how their parents could tell them apart even when their clothes matched and they blinked in time.  Kaoru simply could not understand, because when he looked at Hikaru sitting only feet away – head bowed in concentration over his paper and crayons – he saw himself as he was in the mirror down to the swoop of his hair and the cant of his head.

They were drawing on the floor - Hikaru next to Kaoru and Kaoru next to Hikaru, their shoulders so close that they almost brushed – when they finally figured it out.  Hikaru had a blue crayon clutched tightly in a childish, four fingered grip.  Kaoru had a yellow crayon, but he actually wanted pink, so reached out to grab for the crayon box.  In the process, his elbow knocked Hikaru’s hand, causing a blue streak to mar his brother’s page.

Hikaru was furious, angry tears bubbling in his eyes until it happened again in reverse, Hikaru’s furious scribbles bumping into Kaoru’s hand so that he accidently colored his plants pink instead of green.

“Aw, come on,” Kaoru said.

“Stop drawing with the wrong hand then,” Hikaru bit back.

And that really was the crux of it.

When Kaoru went left, Hikaru went right, reflected perfectly down an invisible line between them.

They switched sides – switched hands – Kaoru choking on frustration as he tried to bully his stupid, worthless right hand into writing something legible, but it felt like he had a fish tied to his wrist, floppy and clammy and useless useless _useless_

Worse, though, were Hikaru’s words, which soon after their switch became as twisted and knotted as Kaoru’s fingers.  The longer they kept at it, the more difficult it became for Hikaru to speak, and his originally mild manner turned embarrassed and defensive.  He would reach and reach, his tongue skipping over syllables again-again-again, but when he finally grasped a word in its whole, it was rarely the one he wanted.

Kids could not help but be cruel, their laughs and derisions bolstered on by Hikaru’s stutter and Kaoru’s unintelligible scrawl, and Kaoru’s left hand gripped Hikaru’s right hand tighter until they might as well have been fused together.

Kaoru began to fill in his brother’s gaps, saying the words that Hikaru could not find.

“We w-….we wan-t-“

“-to go to the toy store, mom.  There’s-“

“-a new r-raptorman action figure-“

“-and we _need_ it.”

Hikaru found that words came easier when he knew his brother was going to be saying them too, and soon their back-and-forth stereo sound reduced down to a single track – one voice inseparable from the other.

Hikaru would write for Kaoru, and Kaoru would write for Hikaru, left hand and right hand, until no matter where the pen was held, the scrawl looked the same.  If Hikaru was on the left, he would write with his left so that his elbow did not knock Kaoru’s.  When Kaoru was on the right, he would gesture with his right so that his gesticulations matched his brother’s – a mirror of a mirror.

And so it went.  Hikaru on his own was the twin that stuttered and huffed and bit to hide his shame.  Kaoru alone was the twin that hesitated, hands shaking in anticipation of lines ruined before they had begun.

Together, though, they were perfect, lining up right in the middle and filling in each other’s parts.  Mirrored forward and mirrored back.

And only a little bit broken.


End file.
